Perfection
by staindgrey
Summary: Relena has but one wish left in these times of peace... But does Heero have that same wish? Does he even know, himself? 01 x R


**Disclaimer: **I do not own Gundam Wing, any of its characters, or anything associated with the Gundam series. That's a shocker. I do, however, own this storyline, considering I made it myself, so don't go stealing my ideas. Thank you.

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_The year, After Colony 198. Peace has finally been achieved following the Great War between Earth and the White Fang, a group fighting for the independence of the space colonies from the Earth's World Nation. After seeing the sacrifices made through war, Earth and space were finally able to coexist in peace and create the Earth Sphere United Nation, eliminating all former boundaries and weaponry, following the ideals of total pacifism held by the Peacecraft family and the Sanc Kingdom. Since this new nation was created, all mobile suits and other weaponry, including the Gundams, were destroyed in order to maintain peace and prevent the misuse of such devices. The Gundam pilots have gone their separate ways, some to the Preventers, a small group created behind the scenes to foil any attempts at overthrowing the fragile and vulnerable government, and some to the quiet of home life. Vice Foreign Minister Relena Darlain, choosing to keep her paternal father's name over that of the Peacecrafts, is now a leading figure in this world peace, though she is still only eighteen years of age._

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**Perfection by Staindgrey**

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"How can I possibly maintain the peace of an entire world... when I can hardly find peace in my own heart?" The words fell on deaf ears within the large but empty room. The words came from a slender young woman, Relena Darlain, standing behind her large oak desk and staring out the even larger window, clutching tightly to her tiny brown teddy bear in a choke hold beneath her arms. She was diplomatically dressed with the long, tailed white coat of the Vice Foreign Minister of the Earth Sphere United Nation draped over a navy blue vest and pants. Her milk chocolate hair was pinned up into a bun, adding to her dignified and prodigiously mature look. Her eyes, though, revealed her true age: that of a starry-eyed teenage girl filled with hopes of love, fears of loss, and confusion between the two. Her sapphire eyes glinted in the fading sunlight, her pale and unchanging expression looking like that of a sad doll's. She began to squeeze her poor teddy bear tighter as her head lowered, her eyes left in a trance and refusing to comprehend what they were actually beholding. She was lost in thought, lost in time and lost from reality. It hurt her so much to think of him. The memories... or, rather, lack of memories killed her. He would always be around just long enough for her to fall in love with him all over again, then he would leave on another mission, leaving her behind without so much as a goodbye or even a reason for going. But he would be back; she knew it. Her life was on the line every second of every day as a leading figure in a worldwide government, and, though he would never let such emotions show, she knew he cared for her enough to not let her get killed; that had been proven multiple times before. As thoughts of him engulfed her mind, ringing time and time again like the knell of a funeral bell, she whimpered softly, "Heero..."

Relena heaved a painful sigh as her eyes regained their normal sense and once again looked out to the seaside just below her castle. The water was a deep, dazzling shade of cerulean, contrasting well with the pink sky and blood red clouds hovering above it. In the middle of the portrait lay the sun, in all of its bright, golden beauty, one half in the sky, the other reflecting on the ocean's blank surface. It was a beautiful setting, as if God himself had painted it just for her. But she couldn't even think of that; all she saw reflecting in the water's surface was him- Heero Yuy. She saw him, with his "perfect soldier" façade that he could never let down. His expression unwavering, with his bangs ruffled up and swaying around right before his eyes... _His eyes..._ The cobalt orbs told the story of a kind-hearted young boy being stripped of his childhood, much like herself, to become perfect- the perfect soldier. She knew that deep inside he was still that wishful, innocent kid, but it was almost impossible to draw that part of him out. She was determined, however, to do so, just as she was determined to maintain this world peace that both of them had fought so hard to achieve. This was her duty, not to chase after some boy. And yet, despite these thoughts, his name rolled off of her suave, youthful tongue once again, just as it had many times before, "_Heero..._"

There was a knock at the door. "Miss Darlain?" It was a boy, most likely her exact age, but he sounded hesitant, unsure, afraid of saying the wrong thing in the presence of a superior. What she would give to live in the shadow of a superior instead of casting the shadow herself.

"Come in," was her polite reply as she set the teddy bear in her hands on the desk and turned to face the door. The next second, the young man stepped in, not closing the door behind him.

"Ma'am, the leaders of the L1 Quadrant space colonies are all here and are awaiting your appearance."

"Thank you." She once again replied in but two words.

"Ma'am." Without hesitation, the youth gave her a small salute and left the room, shutting the door quickly behind him. Relena often wondered why people still saluted and spoke so militaristically towards her; she had no part in the war and, for that matter, had no right being their superior. For the most part, the ones that saluted her were actually older than she was. She was no more than a little girl in a big world, and she knew it. She was made out to be the perfect princess, and that was the veneer that she was both blessed and damned to live with. She gazed one last time into the lifeless, black bead eyes of the teddy bear that Heero had given her over two years ago, seeing the Gundam pilot's eyes staring right back into her. She wished those eyes were real, and not only her youthful imagination playing tricks on her again... She wished he was here, that he would _stay _here... She wished she could just feel what it was like to be loved...

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_Hurry up back there... _the young brunette thought to himself as he cautiously looked around for intruders. He wore an old Oz uniform, a black and red button-up jacket over white pants and high black boots with a white bandana wrapped around his left arm, signifying that he was part of the remnants still left of the White Fang. He was nervous; this was his first mission ever to be sent out on. He was to guard the hallway leading to where the other two White Fang members worked, and no one was to pass him, civilian or otherwise. He held his automatic tight against his chest, his eyes darting every which way in the anxious anticipation of someone coming by- maybe the Preventers.

Suddenly, a youthful man dressed in a castle servant's attire casually strolled around the corner and towards the White Fang member. The fearful soldier lifted his gun and pointed it directly at the civilian, though he only stopped and stared at the soldier, his deep blue eyes lacking fear.

"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave the premises; you're not authorized to be here!" His voice was shaky, as if he were the one in danger. It was obvious to the other youth that this was definitely his first time on any sort of military operation.

"I'm sorry, I must have lingered down the wrong hallway. My apologies," the lackluster voice responded. The adolescent, taking one last moment to look over the White Fang soldier, turned and slowly went back around the corner from which he came. The soldier then sighed in relief and lowered his weapon.

Within seconds, his ear caught the sound of a door swinging open, and right after that, the sound of said door slamming against the wall beside it. The soldier turned to see his two comrades running out of the doorway and towards him, shouting, "Go! Go!"

"Is it set?" the youngest of the three shouted back as he began to move with their pace.

"Yeah, we got less than ten minutes! Move!"

The youngest waited for the other two to catch up, then all three darted down the hallway, turning the corner with the briskness of antelopes being chased by a lion; but the lion was one step ahead, waiting right where they were heading.

"Going somewhere?" It was that same monotone voice that the guard had heard earlier. All three men stopped in their tracks as they realized who it came from- a young man, wearing a castle servant's black suit, pointing a pistol directly at them. Their faces flushed as waves of liquid fear crawled through their clammy skin. The one in front already had his weapon out, but wasn't quick enough to use it at all. In an instant a shot rang out, a mass of burgundy gore spraying out the back of his head as he fell lifeless to the ground behind him. The other two soldiers' souls seemed to escape them as they watched him hit the ground like an inanimate doll, crashing against the hard surface, bouncing back up for an instant, then landing once again, where it would stay. His eyes were transfixed towards the ceiling, or heaven, perhaps, with a black ashen hole lying square in between the bloodshot, inert orbs. Before either of them could do anything in retaliation, however, they in turn suffered the same fate.

Heero Yuy watched as if in slow motion as they all fell to their deaths; whether they died before they hit the ground or not he had no clue, he'd never died before. But as he fired each blast, he hoped for their sake that his shots were quick and relatively painless, so they wouldn't suffer. He detested killing just as any other human being would, but it was his job, his duty. It was all he had ever known, all he was ever taught, and it was all he was ever good at. Now, even in times of peace, he was stuck killing, avenging, sacrificing. Why was he damned to such a hell on Earth?

Without a moment's hesitation, Heero ran back down the hall from which the three men had come, finding the flung open door and making his way inside. His gun still in hand, he examined the room carefully. His guess was that they placed a bomb somewhere close enough to harm Relena, but this room wasn't quite near enough to the conference room to assure her death with a relatively small bomb; he'd seen them bring it in, and by its size he estimated that its explosion would have a max radius of about one hundred meters- another nifty trick the Gundam scientists had taught him in his childhood, when he should have been playing with action figures and watching Saturday morning cartoons. Heero walked steadily inside, finding that there were no exits from the room besides the one he'd just entered through and...

"The air vent," he thought aloud. With that he put his gun back in the holster at his side, discarded his suit top and walked up to the vent cover. Sure enough, its hinges were loosened and its screws completely missing. He jammed his fingers underneath its sides and yanked it off, tossing it to the ground behind him. As he pulled himself up into the cramped outlet, his voice box emitted something he wasn't sure why he said: "I won't let you die, Relena." He then ignored his own comment as if it had never happened and continued crawling through the tiny metal pathway.

Why did he care so much about her safety? Stupid question. He knew why. But why couldn't he dispel this emotion just as he could all others? He knew such feelings would only interfere with his work, and he did his best to suppress it, but the fact that Miss Relena constantly needed to be saved didn't help the situation too much; he would always be near her, always. Could he get any nearer without jeopardizing either of their lives?

After about a minute of crawling, he began to hear an angel's voice speaking from a short distance away, her divine tone ringing in the small compartment like a lovely opera. Heero knew the voice well. "Relena..." She was speaking to some important leaders of sorts, he was sure, and she was giving the same old pacifistic lecture she had used every time before- long, dragged out, and overly idealistic. He'd heard it before, yet every time it reached his ears it was as if it was the first time. He'd often wondered if that was just his adolescent mind playing tricks on him or if that was the way she always reached people. After all, she was able to capture audience after audience with the same old thing every time; she must be doing something right.

Finally he found what he had been searching for. Placed up against the vent door leading to the conference room where Relena was speaking was an eight inch electronic explosive with "6:42" displayed in bright green and counting down. That was plenty of time to dismantle a bomb. Heero pulled out a flat-head screwdriver and lodged it underneath the front cover of the bomb, forcing it up and off and displaying the puzzle of chips and wires beneath. He looked over the different colored wires with a keen eye, examining each one and its place before cutting anything. He twiddled with a few of them before realizing something horrifying-

"It's a dud!" Heero's voice showed about as much emotion as it ever had with the exclamation. It was still in a hushed voice so that no one could hear him, but what was the use in secrecy when he couldn't stop the problem anyway? He couldn't believe he'd been tricked like this, especially by lowly soldiers like those back there... No, he wasn't outsmarted by them. There was someone else behind the scenes, someone clever enough to know that he'd be on the lookout for terrorists blatantly trying to kill Relena. It was someone who knew all about him, about the Preventers...

Heero hastily adjusted himself in the small compartment, spinning around so that his feet were facing the dud bomb. Without hesitation, he then kicked the vent door fiercely, unlatching it and sending it towards the ground with chunks of drywall following behind it. Following its clang against the ground was a throng of gasps, then a silent hush throughout the large room as Heero dropped from the air vent, landing on his feet and standing to face everyone with the same toneless expression as was always plastered on his face.

"Heero...?" was the only word that escaped the Vice Foreign Minister's lips, immediately being magnified over the speakers above her for all to hear. Heero didn't even glimpse at her.

"Everyone must leave the building right now," he calmly stated loudly enough for everyone in the room to hear. "Terrorists have set bombs in the building, and they're set to go off at anytime." His words were instantly met with gasps and cries as the normally upright and dignified diplomats began to hastily jump from their seats and head for the exit. Relena, however, was still awestruck by Heero's sudden appearance, not yet understanding the fact that the room was about to explode. Finally, her personal valet, Pagan, lightly grabbed her arm and politely urged her to get going.

"Miss Relena," he stated in his normal scratchy voice, "you must get out of here before anything happens to you. Allow me to escort-"

"I've got her," Heero interrupted, still standing in the same spot beside the stage where Relena and Pagan stood, both relatively surprised by his words. He was staring directly at Relena with the same cold stare as always, though she knew it wasn't truly cold at all. It was his expression, the 'Heero' face. She nodded in confirmation.

"Pagan, please don't worry about me. I want you to alert everyone in the building and tell them to evacuate at once." Her voice was strong, unwavering, like that of an old queen giving orders once again; sometimes it was impossible to tell her true age of eighteen.

"Of course," was Pagan's reply as he dismissed himself with a bow. Relena then gracefully sauntered down the steps towards Heero as if they were about to leave for a date. Heero scoffed inwardly and quickly took her hand, pulling her behind him.

"Heero, where are you going?" she demanded, her hand still tightly clasped with her hero's as he dragged her along behind him. "The exit is on _that _side of the building!"

"Don't worry, we're making our own exit," was his blank reply. He knew trying to get her out through a crowd of frightened people would be virtually impossible, and unless they all acted somewhat orderly, they would all perish at the front of the building, he and Relena included. If he was right about this unknown mastermind behind the bombing, there were probably bombs set up in the building awhile before Heero was even there, and they were set to detonate in less than the ten minutes allotted for the dud to go off; he wanted Heero dead just as much as he wanted Relena.

Suddenly, Pagan's voice came over the intercom system placed throughout the building. "Attention all residents, everyone must evacuate the building immediately. This is not a drill. I repeat, everyone must evacuate immediately..."

"No good," Heero muttered bluntly. "Now there'll be even more chaos."

"But we have to get as many innocent people out of here as possible!" a breathless Relena scolded from behind him.

"Right now, my only objective is you." The comment caught Relena off guard, her eyes fully showing her unawareness as they opened to twice their normal size, staring blankly at the boy in front of her. He must have meant the mission, not just her... right?

Suddenly she tripped, unable to keep up with Heero's pace. She clutched his hand as tightly as her delicate fingers could, but she still hit the floor hard, her shoulder taking the first blow with her head following suit. Heero, without a word, grabbed her and picked her up in his arms, continuing forward. She had a scuff mark above her brow, and she winced in pain from her shoulder. Nevertheless, she reproached Heero for his efforts. "Heero, put me down! I'm alright, I can-"

"Shut up," Heero shot back with as little emotion as ever. His breathing had hardly accelerated, and his eyes were still transfixed on what lay ahead, not bothering to look at Relena at all. Relena looked into his cobalt eyes, so distant... Was this who he really was, uncaring for any one person, even her, unless they were part of his mission? Had she just imagined the feelings she thought he possessed? Was her wish even more inane and idealistic then this new world peace in which her castle was about to be demolished in? She sighed in utter confusion as her decorated knight continued to carry her, though she knew he would once again become the hidden peasant once she was out of harm's way. It was true; history really did forever repeat itself.

Now people were rushing into the hallways, their current against Heero and Relena, pushing against them with the force of a high tide. Heero continued trudging through, almost to his destination. By now Relena could tell where they were going, but she was unsure as to why. Her quarters were right at the end of this corridor; that had to be it. She hung to Heero's neck tighter than ever, burying her head into his shoulder with small beads of water forming at the corners of her eyes.

As they reached the entryway to her room, Heero wasted no time by kicking through the door. As he ran into the room toward the desk and the enormous window lying behind it, he finally set Relena down to her feet and headed to the wall of glass with her hand in his.

"Heero, what are you doing?" Heero looked through the window without a response. Then sun was almost fully set now, letting the darker shades of night slowly descend over its fading pink sky. He looked directly down, seeing that the waves were relatively close to high tide, allowing the water come closer to the castle. "Heero, why don't you answer me? Heero!" He continued surveying the land below, not heeding any of her cries. "You always do this; you're always so cold. Why? Why must you constantly keep everything a secret? Is it so hard to just tell me what's going on inside your head once in awhile?" She continued, Heero now looking directly at her, his eyes meeting hers in a fiery battle, "I just don't understand you! You act as if every moment of your life is top secret and that I'm just a stupid little girl that doesn't need to know anything about what you're thinking! Why, Heero, why?" Her anger toned down as tears once again formed in her beautiful sapphire orbs, though she tried to hold them back. Heero responded only by pulling out his pistol and turning away from the young Vice Foreign Minister. "Now what are you doing? Heero! Answer-"

Five shots rang out- almost simultaneously, they were so quick. Immediately after each blast was the sound of shattering glass, followed by the echoes of the shards breaking against the floor like raindrops. At the end of the display, a hole approximately a full meter in diameter was left in the window. Heero then put his gun back in its holster and, without looking at Relena, asked, "Do you trust me?"

Relena was caught off guard. He always did this too, calming the situation with some sort of short, concise phrase that left her stumbling searching for words. No one could do this to her but him. She had given speech after speech regarding pacifism, but it was so hard just answer his simple questions. She finally forced an answer out, saying, "Well, I have no reason not to..."

"Then stop asking so many questions." He then turned to face her again, his eyes never losing sight of her own. Contrasting his, they were teary, saddened, and wishful all at the same time. There was still hope for her wish to come true. Maybe, just maybe... Maybe he loved her after all.

All of a sudden the sound of a raging explosion came from outside the room. Heero wasted no time in grabbing a hold of the Peacecraft princess and leaping out of his self-made exit, fire engulfing the wooden room behind him almost immediately after he did so. The rush of boiling air overtook both him and his maiden, though he shielded her with his own body as it did. Her head was buried in his chest as she tried to let out a scream that wouldn't come, leaving only a coughing sound in its place, resulting from a combination of tears and fiery ash. The overwhelming heat was soon replaced with the brisk summer air rushing past them as they fell towards the beach below, the artificial sun above now dwindling back down to the flicker of a candle as they fell further and further away. Heero knew this was going to be a tough landing, but her majesty's safety was more important than his own. Now out of the way of the fireball that was her dorm, he flipped himself over, his singed back facing the ground below with Relena still tightly held in his arms. As they twirled in the evening air, Relena locked gazes with her fallen angel, who had once again saved her life yet expected nothing in return. His eyes were the same, determined and distant, but she could sense a sort of compassion beaming from them. She knew how he felt, she knew.

Within seconds they hit the water, breaking their fall enough to keep them from being seriously injured once they struck the solid ground merely a meter below its surface. Heero took much of the blow, his breath escaping him as he felt his back slam against two different surfaces almost simultaneously. Relena grabbed onto him for dear life, her forehead almost puncturing a hole through his chest. Refusing to let himself lose consciousness, Heero pushed his body back up, gingerly getting up to his feet with Relena still in his arms. As they broke the water's surface, both were hacking uncontrollably, Heero barely able to stand. The water was a little over waste high, but he made sure Relena was out of the water entirely as he trudged through the tide to get back to shore, not waiting a second to catch his breath. Once he made it to the coast, he finally laid her, along with himself, down on the soft, cold, sandy mattress. He wanted to stay there and rest, as did she, but both of them knew that that was destined to become an unanswered wish.

Relena's breathing returned to normal as she stared up with hazy vision at her burning kingdom above her. Surprisingly, however, she hardly felt remorse. Of course, it was where she lived, but she had seen it burn down before, and they rebuilt it. Brick and stones can easily be rebuilt; it was the lives of the people inside she cared about. But even so, there was something even more important on her mind at the moment, and he was still coughing up water beside her.

She turned to her side to face her hero, her eyes displaying a mixture of apprehension and gratitude. She knew he would be fine; he always was, but she still worried nonetheless. She remained quiet until his coughing fit stopped, and his breathing slowly returned to normal. His eyes remained closed, his body inanimate. The soft breeze blew his dark chocolate bangs across his face, which was coated with a mixture of sea water and sweat. Relena propped herself up on an elbow to get a better view of the fallen angel and beheld him for all he was worth. She undid her professional bun and let her soaked locks hang freely at her side, whipping them back over to her side to get them out of the way. She then delicately brushed Heero's sodden bangs out of his face, never taking her eyes off of his beatific, latent face. Whether he was conscious or not, she wasn't sure, but she was determined to watch over him until he was.

Finally she stood to her feet, removing her jacket and vest as well as her shoes, leaving only her drenched white pants and shirt, though no one could see anything through their thick material in the oncoming night. She laid them aside, then took a hunched seated position next to Heero, her guardian angel, and looked out to the lonely sea with just as lonely eyes. The reflection of her burning home stayed at the sea's calm surface as if to keep her from looking away from the tragedy that, in a sense, was her fault. She should have never allowed something like this to happen, and now all of the people that put their faith in her were either dead or without a home. She could have prevented this- no, _should _have prevented this. Were her ideals for total pacifism truly just a laughable joke? If she were strong enough, she wouldn't need Heero to come to her rescue all the time; she could thwart the problems before they even occurred. Wasn't that her objective as Vice Foreign Minister in the first place? Her mind went racing in circles, trying to take in everything that had just happened and rationalize it, but her brain just didn't seem to be working right. Every time she tried to focus on the problem at hand, all she could think of was him. "Heero..." she said in such a hushed, worried voice.

"You mean... you haven't left yet?" Heero grunted, his eyes still unopened.

"Heero!" Relena immediately grabbed him around the neck, nearly cutting off his air as she squeezed as tightly as her dainty arms could. He grunted again in return, showing he was in obvious pain. He wouldn't let it show much more than that, though. She let go and beheld his two half-open cerulean orbs looking back at her with that same unchanging expression.

"I thought you would've gone and tried to get help by now," he said, half sarcastically.

"And trust you to stay in one spot? Never." She reached an arm behind his sodden back and lifted him up, Heero pulling most of the weight himself. He gave another slight groan and wince as he did, but that was all. "You're in pain."

"Yeah," was his only reply. He and Relena had always had a peculiar relationship. Each of them knew what the other was going to say before they said it, and yet they said it anyway. Relena would state the obvious and Heero would respond with only the necessary amount needed, adding no flare or even extra slang to the comment. Then she would smile, as she was now, merely at the sound of his voice, hoping that someday he would say a little bit more for her. She placed a hand over his forehead and wiped away some of the sweat formed there, then trailed her fingertips down his left cheek gently. "Relena... Please..."

"Don't worry, I won't hurt you," she responded in a small, heartfelt notion.

"I know you won't." Heero backed away from her hand and whipped his head around to look her in the eye. His expression was once again cold, ready for battle, just like that of the perfect soldier. "You wouldn't hurt a single living thing on this planet or anywhere else. But it's your soothing touch that wards me."

His comment completely baffled Relena. _It's my 'soothing touch' that wards him? _"I'm afraid I don't understand, Heero..."

"Relena, I'm not who you think I am," he answered in a lifeless, robotic voice, "I'm not your majestic knight whose only purpose in life is to save you. The only reason I do so is because your life is in constant danger and you're the most important part of this new peace. That's it."

The words pierced through her. Was he only saying this to ward her off or was this the honest truth? "Heero, please... Don't say such things..." was the best reply she could muster.

"Then stop thinking of me as a lovesick boy pining after you." Once again, straight to the heart, relentlessly. Relena gave a short gasp as she recollected the words. The dream was over- no, the dream had never begun. It was merely a dream, a fantasy created by a wishful, ignorant little girl. That's all she was. That's all she was...

"Heero, I... I..."

Heero didn't bother to stop and listen. With a hushed grunt he pushed himself to his feet, brushed some of the sand off of his sopping clothes, and began to walk steadily forward, leaving Relena sitting, lost and confused, behind him. Her emotions were aflame, much like her kingdom directly above her. Thoughts of love and hate swirled around inside her head, much like the wind before a storm. Her hands were shaking, clenching handfuls of sand then releasing them while her eyes never left the perfect image of Heero drifting away from her...

"No!"

Heero didn't stop.

"Heero!"

Still, he did not stop. He did not even glance back. Relena, her eyes red and soaked, searched with blurred vision for a projectile and found a decent-sized seashell by her side. She picked it up and, rising to her feet, immediately chucked it directly at Heero. It landed precisely on its target, slamming into the back of his head and falling back to the earth below it, its mission accomplished. Heero stopped walking, standing completely still as if made of stone. He never turned to face his aggressor.

"How can you be so cold? How!" Relena screamed, tears now mixing with beads of salt water still present on her pale skin. "Is it truly impossible for you to love? Is it so hard to even have compassion for someone who only wants to love you; who only wants to be loved?" Her shouts went unheeded; the statue didn't move. "Heero! Answer me!"

Silence. Cold, dead silence. The fire was being exterminated now by the firefighting forces, most of it already out by now. People were crying, searching desperately for their friends and family members, hoping to God that they were alive. A gentle wind blew in from the sea, bringing a cold chill to the two soaked teens, neither of which noticed. Neither of them noticed anything at all in the world besides each other and the tension between them. After a short fraction of eternity, Heero turned slightly to face Relena, his side to her. Their eyes locked, his still unwavering, hers overflowing. Heero knew what he wanted to do, but he knew what he must do as well. Those two conflicted, and always would conflict, and he knew that. He only wished that Relena Darlain, considered to be one of the most genius persons of the new age, could understand that as well.

"Relena..."

Without a moment's hesitation, Relena sprinted across the plain of sand between them, covering the distance shortly. As she did, Heero turned completely to face her, reluctantly accepting her leaping body into his arms. She clasped her arms around his neck, once again burying her face into his sodden shirt, muffling her cries. Heero, in turn, wrapped his arms around her, hugging her tightly and letting her cry against him. He had been brought up not to do this, trained to stay away from this feeling at all cost, yet here he was experiencing it. The perfect soldier, practicing the most imperfect practice. He rubbed his hands soothingly along her back, feeling her cold flesh shiver underneath the wet material. He gently laid his head atop hers as she shuddered and continued sobbing, sniffing and continually spitting out muffled, hateful words. She began to pound her fist against his chest, but he didn't retaliate. He let her continue her fit until she wore herself out and her crying shrank to that of a whimper. Her face never lifted from his torso, finding a temporary comfort there. At long last, she regained her composure enough to speak indicatively.

"Heero... Please tell me... Why can't we be together?" Before he could answer, she lifted her head to gaze at him directly, then continued, "I know that you have feelings for me in return, or else you wouldn't have sacrificed so much for me... Don't lie to me. Don't tell me you can't feel love because I know you can... Why can you not put down your barriers and simply allow yourself to be loved?"

"For the same reason that you can't kill," he replied. His tone was still static, but his eyes were different- troubled, maybe. "I have lived with nothing but war all my life. I have trained, fought, and lived for war. Now, even in times of peace, I can't escape war. But you..." He paused for a second, a small sort of grin finding its way to his lips. "You have so much to offer to this world. You can love sincerely and unconditionally. You can care for the uncared for and lift people's spirits so high they have to look down to see heaven. That is why... you cannot love me."

"But I do, Heero! I love you!" She had never said these words out loud to anyone before. Relena Darlain-Peacecraft had always put raw emotion aside, just as Heero had, and concentrated fully on her dream of total pacifism. But now, the spotlight was off of her. The press was gone. To her, the world was gone. All that was left were a boy and a girl, the girl simply wishing to be loved, the boy only wishing to remain silent. Tears streamed down her face more slowly than before, but it seemed now as though each individual tear had more sentiment than all the others had before. She repeated, "I love you, Heero!"

"I know you do," he hesitantly replied, "but there's no place for that in perfection."

Relena was once again left speechless. What did he mean, 'there's no place for that in perfection'? "Wh-What? Per...fection...?"

"I am the perfect soldier. I was raised to be just that," he explained, "and I was told that the enemy is not hate and evil as the storybooks say, but rather... the very feeling that can corrupt us all into believing what we want to believe, rather than what is truth."

"L-love..." She looked away from Heero as he continued.

"And you, Relena, are the perfect idol for peace. You're pure of heart with pure intentions. You let nothing obstruct your vision of your final goal: total pacifism. That is something someone like me can never fathom. It's your duty to remain strong and not succumb to such feelings as love-"

"But why is love so evil? Why can I not love _and _search out peace?" Her head was once again lodged into his chest, muffling her words as she spoke.

"It isn't evil. It's the exact opposite. But either end of such a huge spectrum as feelings can hinder one's thoughts to only that fraction... Whether it be love or hate, it doesn't matter. When you hate someone, you can lose control to the point that the only thing you can see is their destruction. But when you love someone wholeheartedly... you can lose sight of everything else in your life that you've worked so hard for, only so you can be with them, alive or dead."

Relena stopped crying. She took all of this in, analyzing each and every bit like a calculator taking in an equation. The sound of each and every word reverberated inside her mind like a jackhammer. She understood, but at the same time she didn't want to understand. She wanted to return to her false reality of hoping for love, of wishing for her knight to ride in and save her... Her wish shattered against the barren, comatose ground of despondency, the winds of loneliness and hopelessness casting the broken shards into an endless sky of black, never to be found again. Was this what it was like to feel true despair? Or was this simply her weak, feminine mind telling her she was in despair? Why was she so weak while Heero was so strong? Why?

"Heero..." she whispered, lifting her head from his chest to fully look him in the eye. She was now beyond tears, her soul seeming to have escaped her somewhere in the conversation. "If I can never experience love... at least let me experience what is tastes like to be in love... to be loved..."

Rain was beginning to pour now, as if the heavens themselves were weeping over the star-crossed lovers' loss. The drops initially came slowly and few, but over the passing moments their numbers grew, each drop steadily gaining size and making bigger and bigger splashes on impact. The raindrops pelted the two youths' faces, their small assailant sounds echoing in large numbers. The sun, completely set now, left behind it a blanket of stars to cover the Earth while it lay in wait for a new day to come. For now, the entire world was stopped- all except for a Gundam pilot and a Peacecraft heir.

"Relena..." Heero seemed to be begging her to let it go, but she persisted.

"Please... Just once, just now... I wish for the end of my perfection..."

Her lips stopped speaking as she felt an identical pair press against hers in one swift motion. Her eyes shot from halfway to more than fully open in an instant, but then eased and closed as she herself slipped into the warm kiss. She shivered at his surprisingly loving touch, one hand wrapping itself around behind her head, tangling his fingers with her soaked mass of hair, the other feeling along her arched back tenderly and affectionately. She was lost in bliss, her entire body trembling at his very contact. Inside her mind her thoughts ran wild like a once caged animal now let loose, destroying and demolishing every old thought surrounding it. She was free; her heart was free. She lifted herself to her tiptoes to be at an even height with Heero, finally attacking back as she forced her virgin pink tongue between his lips. His cherry muscle gladly accepted the challenge, pushing back against the invader and engaging in a wrestling match for dominance. They continued the heated French kiss, their mouths occasionally opening for air but never leaving the other but for a fraction of a second. Suddenly, the girl who had been so cold before was now the true heat of summer, as was her newly found feral passion exploding inside her like fireworks on a once black July night. This was what love was; this was what she had been wishing for for so incredibly long. Her only thoughts were on her hero, her valiant champion that was holding her at this very moment- Heero Yuy. _Heero... I truly love you... with all my heart..._

"You there! Are you two alright?" A spotlight was suddenly shown on the two lovers, a search and rescue worker next to it holding a megaphone. The two parted abruptly, Relena staring flabbergasted into the light as a deer would previous to being run over while Heero covered his face. As a member of the Preventers, he couldn't be seen. In an instant, Heero was gone, dashing away from the girl he'd just kissed and taking her heart with him. She watched unbelievingly as she lost his outline in the inexhaustible darkness surrounding her. Her delicate fingers gradually found their way to her lips, where she still tasted his essence and refused to believe he was already gone. This couldn't have happened. She was so close, so utterly close... _Is this what love truly is? A momentary dream becoming reality and then vanishing? Was this what I had wished for...?_

"No! We lost him!" a gruff voice called from above as a second searchlight hunted for the Gundam pilot. "You two, chase after him! You, go get the girl!" One of the men rushed down the hill towards her, but she couldn't move. She could barely even tell that there was any man at all. She was lost in thought, transfixed on her short-term memory to the point where she almost thought she was reliving it. His touch... His scent... His taste... It was all real, all so very real...

"Miss Relena...?"

-----

Relena Darlain sat at the edge of the hotel bed, her paperwork neatly stacked in her lap atop a deep crimson skirt. She reviewed the top paper intently, reading it over and over in her head, line by line, mumbling the words inside her mouth in a way only she could hear. She did this for every speech she gave, making sure that there were no errors at all in her work. As someone had once told her, she must strive to be perfect in order to achieve a perfect world.

Someone knocked at the door. "Miss Darlain?"

Relena readied her innocent smile for the guest and said in a mildly cheerful tone, "Come in, it's unlocked." Immediately, the man opened the door and walked in, holding a letter of some sort.

"A note for you, Miss Darlain, left at the counter by a visitor." He walked up and handed it to her, bowing slightly as he did out of respect. He added, "We checked it already for any sort of toxin or drug. The paper is secure."

"Thank you. You may leave now," she responded with a nod of her head.

"Ma'am." The server then quickly walked out, shutting the door behind him as Relena unfolded the note. It was a plain and simple note, unheaded and unsigned with scratchy handwriting. Bewildered, she read it aloud to herself:

"_Relena, I'm leaving for now and I'm not sure when I'll be back. I'm not fleeing from you, and I promise I will return. But before I left I decided that you must know something: I am not the perfect soldier, and I will never be. The only point in my life where I have ever felt perfect was when we were one, and I intend on reliving that perfection. Goodbye, Relena._"

By the end of her recitation there were two spots smudged on the paper, one drop from each of her sapphire eyes. She reread the paper silently to disprove the thought that this was merely a dream, and as she did she noticed where the two wet stains were located: on the words "I" and "you". As a brightened smile found its way across her ashen face, a third teardrop fell, this time landing on... "perfection".


End file.
